According to statistics released yesterday by National Records of Scotland the favourite choices for second names are James and Rose.
In second place are John and Elizabeth, followed by William and Grace and then Alexander and Margaret in fourth position.
Although it is not mandatory to have a second name 83% of all boys and 78% of girls registered in Scotland had more than one forename.
It appears that second names are more traditional than first names, often using names from previous generations. This list does not change much from year to year, although Elizabeth was overtaken by Rose in 2012.
The top ten of second names chosen in the years between 2006 and 2012 did not change at all, and there was just a minor change among the rankings.
But more recently there have been changes at the bottom of the league for girls names with May replacing Mary and Ann disappearing in 2014 only to make a comeback in the following year.
But as well as following tradition with the middle names, it appears that some parents really do look for a completely original first name.
In 2016, 2072 boys and 2671 girls were registered with unique first forenames which is much higher than previous years.
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